The exhibition included works by traditional
masters such as JMW Turner, Nathan Fielding and Walter Sickert and
modern artists including Patrick Heron and Elizabeth Frink.
It brought together rarely seen art work which
had been kept under wraps in the museum's back collections. Also on
display was a new addition to our collections, a work by Thomas
Worlidge, the renowned 18th century engraver who was born in
Peterborough. This engraving was kindly donated by the Friends of
Peterborough Museum & Art Gallery.
Visitors were also able to chart
Peterborough's development from a modest market town to a bustling
m
odern city through local
views and landscapes covering the last 300 years.
As part of the exhibition the clock has been
turned back and part of the exhibition included a recreation of the
wonderful look and feel of the original Maxwell Art Gallery when it
first opened to the public in 1952, thanks to a bequest from Anne
Maxwell Davis in 1939. The building work was postponed due to the
outbreak of war and with only a roof and water-tight walls in place
the gallery became a food storage facility for Peterborough
citizens until the end of hostilities. Construction resumed
post-war and the first exhibition was called Art Treasures with
works loaned from the private collections of local estates.
Two of the rarely seen works from the Museum's
collections include two little-known watercolours by the great
British artist JMW Turner. Famed for his seascapes these two works
are views of Peterborough Cathedral painted on a visit to the city
in 1795. Just like the gallery many of the pictures in the
exhibition have fascinating stories attached to them. The
wedding portraits of Thomas and Caroline Welch-Hunt, dating from
1824, convey a bitter-sweet tale of love and loss. The
wealthy young couple from Northamptonshire had embarked on a grand
tour of Europe for their honeymoon, which was cut tragically short
when they were shot and killed by bandits in Italy.
Many of Peterborough’s most popular cultural and sporting
facilities are part of Vivacity, an independent,
not-for-profit organisation with charitable status.
Find out more about
the trust on the Vivacity website.